The Favourite

2018 Lanthimos movie

Rating: 16/20

Plot: A pair of cousins battle for the attention of a cake-and-bunny-loving, gout-ridden queen while war rages with France.

A Yorgos Lanthimos release is an event in my household, at least as long as I'm the only person in the house. This is his first film that he didn't write. Additionally, it's a costume drama, and period pieces usually aren't my bag. This, however, has the bite of Dangerous Liaisons or Ridicule and retains that Lanthimosian humor that makes everybody in my household swoon, at least as long as I'm the only person in the house. And standing.

With duck races, ridiculous wigs, even more ridiculous anachronistic dances, creepy masturbation sequences, an dispassionate hand-job scene that has oddly become a Lanthimos trademark, biting dialogue filled with (as the kids call them) sick burns, a comically violent courting sequence, this really is my type of movie. And you know what? The costumes look great, and this castle or whatever the setting is gives us lots of opportunities to drool over tapestries, rich architecture, and gorgeous ceilings. Lots and lots of gorgeous, semi-oppressive ceilings.

The battles of wits and the political power grabs are a lot of fun in this Lanthimos-tinted 18th Century England, and the three female leads are all just about perfect. Rachel Weisz and Emma Stone get their moments to be really really mean, and the script forces the viewer to change his or her opinions of them more than a few times. Olivia Coleman's performance is a lot easier to notice because she's huge and has a wilder range of emotions. Coleman's having a blast with this character, likely because it's just a lot of fun to shovel chunks of cake into your mouth with your hands.

I'm going to need more time to think about the fish-eye shots that were used in this as I couldn't figure out any meaning behind them. I think I liked them, at least as much as I liked the other more flamboyant camera work in this.

I saw this in a crowded theater and was annoyed at how boisterously some of the other patrons laughed. I swear, the art theater crowd is more interested in making sure everybody around them knows that they get the jokes more than crowds in your typical popcorn comedies.